


She spent a day in the Institute

by bellzaboo_huffin



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-10
Updated: 2019-07-10
Packaged: 2020-06-25 16:13:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19749238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellzaboo_huffin/pseuds/bellzaboo_huffin
Summary: Sole seeks out the synth replicate of her son. They play a card game and get in trouble for being gone for too long by Dr. Li. X6-88 is the current companion.





	She spent a day in the Institute

**Author's Note:**

> This is a one shot based off a sole survivor I'm writing a full work for. Also found a prompt suggestion on Tumblr and it seemed fun.

The halls were brightly lit, and the sounds of footsteps were loud echoes. She walked through the halls and throughout the departments looking for Shaun. Little Shaun. Shaun 2.0. 

It’s not the first time she’s sought him out to play a card game or to explore some corner of the Institute. But finding the kid was a difficult game of hide and seek. He could be with Dr. Li. He could be with X6-88, sometimes he was wandering the halls trying to get the other kids to play with him. 

She wondered if he knew why the other kids wouldn’t play with him. She knew the other kids thought he was weird and that they had some inference about why, but she didn’t think that they knew he was a synth. 

The institute had a lot of secrets and everything was compartmentalized. It was worse than the Railroads operations. More than once she’d been set out on a mission only to find it had been nearly completed or that someone else had been assigned first. She hated working with other Railroad members. Glory was too brash and in their face, and Deacon was too slip in and out. She’d adapted to the wasteland and with the wasteland comes a myriad of combat styles. X6 was a good companion and friend but she couldn’t take him everywhere even though his combat style matched her nearly perfectly. The secrets were the worst of both factions and she wanted little to do with it.

She’d reached the Synth retention bureau. The SRB. The hub of slavery in this god forsaken underground haven. Is it a haven if there’s slavery? If there’s slavery does it make it worth saving? 

Her moral dilemma was interrupted as she entered the SRB and nearly ran straight into X6. 

“Oh! Sorry X6! Didn’t see you there.” 

“It is alright Ma’am. Are you ready to continue our mission?” 

“Uh, yeah sure. I’m trying to find Shaun. Have you seen him recently?” 

“He is not here.” She rolled her eyes. No shit she thought. I wouldn’t be here while Ayo was awake. An awful man that man was. Drunk with power and a misogynist to boot. Ayo needed replaced soon, before the SRB burnt itself to the ground. She wondered if maybe she could convince Alana to take over now, she was Director to be. Probably not without getting rid of Ayo completely she thought. 

“The synth child may be with Father.” 

“Damn. Alright. Let’s go X6.” She didn’t want to see Father. He might be her son biologically, but god was he insufferable. The man was so blinded by himself that he won’t ever consider a different future for the Institute. It infuriated her that she could see where the institute was failing and how it wouldn’t be able to be self-sufficient longer than the next 50 years without topside interference. And it wasn’t the food or power that was the problem either. 

They walked in silence back up the stairs and around the loop to Father’s quarters. 

“Shaun!” She called into the rooms. 

“Here!” The kids tiny voice floated through the door followed by the sounds of shuffling and then running. She ventured through the door and collided eight he small force of the boy. 

“Hey kiddo. Whatcha doing up here?”

“Father was just lecturing me on talking to the synth workers. It’s not fair. They at least want to talk with me, none of the other kids do. I wish more people would talk with me. Like you.”

“I’m sorry Shaun,” she hugged him and continued, “I found some old playing cards and also an old camera that you wanted. Wanna hit up the food stand and go have a picnic somewhere?”

“Yes, yes, yes! Let’s go!” Shaun pulled her hand with each word and she let herself be pulled away from the door where Father’s voice could barely be heard trying to call her inside. No doubt he wanted yet another mission completed. Let someone else do it,   
she thought in his direction. 

He took his time choosing something to eat from the food synth and led the way to one of many twisting back hallways, before they ended up in one of the mostly empty old rooms of the Institute. The ones that had been locked up prior to her arrival. She had taught the boy to pick the easier locks, but it seems he’d self-taught himself to do the harder locks. It was very simple at the end of the day, and he clearly had a knack for it, just like her, but she hoped he wouldn’t get himself hurt or lost. Although she’d already killed the assaultron within the FEV labs, there shouldn’t be too much danger left, with the exception, of course, of the FEV labs themselves. The needed to be rid of, sooner rather than later. 

“Alright Shaun, help X6 set up the table. I’ll help lay out the food.”

“No problem!” He chirped. The kid was the literal embodiment of the sun and the polar opposite of her. Nate wasn’t exactly sunshine and rainbows either, but the kid rather certainly took after him. How he was always so bright and cheerful was beyond her. Maybe it was because his life hadn’t been tainted by the constant worry of war like hers and Nate’s. She wonders if maybe, between her, Hancock, and Preston, they would be able to help the kid maintain his light once the Institute is no more. 

She placed the Institute food at three places on the table knowing X6 would eat because Shaun was here, and he liked to be normal around the kid. She also knew he had the biggest sweet tooth, knew from the whole NukaWorld excursion. She didn’t know there was so much Nuka Cola in the world otherwise she probably wouldn’t have taken him, so as to save his teeth. 

“Ah man. Chicken again. Why can’t we ever get something like fish or steak?” Shaun whined. 

“I think fish would be pretty hard to get, Shaun. I do wish we had more cakes.” X6 had spent enough time on the surface to know that the only fish were deep in the ocean and far from current human settlements. With the exception of Spectacle Island but she hated the island. The white noise emitter was the most frustrating sound and she couldn’t be there for more than a few hours without nausea setting in. She could agree with Shaun privately though. She did use to love salmon, until it was nearly unobtainable due to the price increases. 

She changed the subject, “Whatcha plan on doing with the old camera?”  
“Oh! I was gonna to learn to take it apart and put it together again. Maybe I’ll make something cool out of it.” 

“Sweet kid. Let me know if you need or want anything. Hey, X6 do you know any card games?” 

“The other children play a game called War. Other times they play a game called Go Fish. I however do not know how to play either.” X6 replied matter-of-factly. 

Shaun set off on a chanting chorus of “War! War! War!” 

Laughing at his antics, she responded with “Alright. War it is.” And shuffled the deck and explained the rules as she dealt the cards to the three players. 

Once she finished, Shaun immediately laid down a card. It was a seven. X6 laid his card down and she laid down her card last. X6 has gotten a six and she had gotten a three. 

“Yes!” Shaun shouted through a mouth full of chicken pieces. He nearly toppled his plate of food to get at the cards in his exuberance. 

“Calm down Shaun!” She laughed at him. 

“Sorry!” His response was muffled from his full mouth. He swallowed his bite and his beam returned. He threw down another card and looked disappointed his two. The other two players placed their cards and she won the set. 

The game continued for a few hours with Shaun winning two games and X6 not winning at all. There were a few rounds of proper War and Shaun won almost all of them. The master of War let out a loud yawn and she wondered what time it was. 

She checked her PIP-Pad. It was getting late, close to six PM, and they had been gone for more time than she had thought. “Alright Shaun, it looks like it’s time to get going before they come looking for you.”

“Aww, do I have to?” He said with another yawn. 

“Yeah, Shaun, you do.” She frowned but followed quickly with, “Maybe we can do something the next time I’m back from the Commonwealth. I can bring you more old stuff. I promise I’ll come back soon.”

Shaun nodded and seemed happier at that. He began to help X6 clean up the cards and the mess from their meal. Once it was all picked up and the three were loaded with stuff they began to head back out of the maze and into the Institute proper. They dropped off the disposable stuff in the eating area and dropped the cards off in her quarters. They were, of course, hidden where only the three of them could find them, in theory. She knew nearly everything was recorded here and she doubted that they would be there when she returned. She and X6 escorted Shaun back to Advanced Systems at a slow but steady pace, preparing for the lecture they were certain to receive. 

Dr. Li was obviously less than thrilled the boy had been out all day, but he tried to quickly reassure her that he was fine and that they stayed in the Institute and other of the many critiques she had. He seemed skilled in this particular scolding and she was sure that he had received the same on many occasions and she smiled at the exchange. 

“Fine, fine, but you have to tell me the next time you choose to disappear for so long,” she scolded him. He replied in the affirmative voice her always used with the doctors and went to his small room in her office with the door closing behind him.   
She saw Li eyeing her and she dropped her smile. 

Li said, “He shouldn’t be away for so long. Who knows what could happen to him?”

“Doctor, I promise we never left the Institute and were locatable at all times. We were safe. We even had X6 with us,” and she pointed at the man in black standing near the doorway. “He was safe from every threat that could possibly be presented here.”

“That may be so. But you would do well to remember that the boy is not your real son.”

“He’s as real as any of the synths can be. You’ll do well to remember that, Li.” She turned and headed out of the area, with X6 following behind. She was so over the synth debate. Let the synths live like they want. Do your own damn work. 

When the were back in the atrium of the Institute, she asked X6 if he preferred any of her quests in the quest log. He indicated he would be interested in doing the missions presented by the robot on the radio and she hummed her affirmative.   
She selected a travel point and was teleported out of the Institute and back into the Commonwealth. She hoped this wouldn’t be too long. She wanted a good night’s sleep without having to worry over the Institute’s spying. As for X6, she trusted him, she wasn’t sure why but she knew he’d always be loyal to her in the end. 

“Alright, X6, let’s get going.” And they set off toward the coordinates left by the radio transmission.

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment, I wouldn't mind feedback. Follow me on Tumblr :) @Courierchell


End file.
